


Anchor Point

by shadowen



Series: Line of Sight [8]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Anal Sex, Comfort, Dirty Talk, Domestic, Engagement, Established Relationship, First Time, Geek Love, Hand Jobs, Insomnia, Late Night Conversations, M/M, Nightmares, Pillow Talk, Possessive Clint, Possessive Phil, Protective Clint, Protective Phil, Rough Sex, Schmoop, Sleep, Waiting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-05
Updated: 2014-02-20
Packaged: 2017-11-23 19:52:38
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 9,221
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/625925
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shadowen/pseuds/shadowen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Six nights in one bed.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Wednesday, November 21, 2007. 10:33 p.m. EST

**Author's Note:**

> The chapters in this story take place at different points chronologically over the course of the series. Posting will be widely spaced, but I promise you'll get the whole thing eventually.

The taste of Clint’s skin was like water in a drought, the sudden fall of rain at the edge of an endless desert. Phil could have given up coffee, alcohol, milk, pop, every drop of any liquid that had ever passed his lips, and be content to drink nothing but this, to swallow from no cup but the hollow of Clint’s throat for the rest of his life.

His tongue tasted like blueberries and root beer, and Phil thought suddenly of highschool, of a nervous boy with braces and unruly brown hair. He remembered sneaking away after baseball practice to make-out behind the right field fence, groping awkwardly on the ground because he didn’t know what to do with his hands.

Phil eased Clint’s t-shirt over his head, and Clint stripped the undershirt impatiently off of him. Bare skin pressed together at last, and Clint shuddered in his arms with a sigh.

“Wanted to do this for so long,” Clint murmured into Phil’s neck, the words a whisper of warm breath.

“I know,” Phil said. “Believe me, I know.”

It had been practice, all of it. Every boyfriend and lover, every fumbling kiss and flush of pleasure, was all in preparation for this, for Clint, for the promise of something so much better.

They fell back on the bed, and Phil trailed open kisses across Clint’s broad chest.

“Thought about it. About you,” Clint said. “Dreamed about you fucking me. I’d wake up hard and have to get off.” His fingers dragged across Phil’s scalp. “I’d touch myself and think about sucking your cock.”

A surge of heat raced up Phil’s spine, and he had to pause, panting against Clint’s stomach. It seemed as if everything had been so slow for so long, and now they were racing toward a precipice that Phil barely understood.

“Do you want to know what I want?” he asked, lifting his head, and Clint’s eyes were on him, wide and dark.

“Yes,” Clint said instantly. “God, yes. Anything. Whatever you want.”

Phil gave him a deep, lingering kiss, licking into his mouth. “I want you to touch me,” he whispered in Clint’s ear. “Touch me the way you touch yourself. Show me.”

Clint shivered and reached immediately for Phil’s trousers, thumbing open his belt and fly with impressive speed. Phil kept sucking slow kisses down the side of his neck until Clint shoved down his pants and grabbed roughly for his cock. Phil gasped and gripped his arm. “Whoah, okay. Maybe, um, maybe a little slower?”

Clint froze and let go, hands dropping to his sides. “I’m sorry,” he stammered. “I didn’t mean to. I... I’m sorry.”

“Don’t. It’s okay,” Phil soothed, kissing him softly. “We’ve got all night.”

Clint huffed. “Well, now you’ve jinxed it. Phone’s gonna ring any second.”

“No it won’t,” Phil assured him. “Barring an immediate threat to global security, we have the night off, per the director’s orders.”

“Wait, Fury knows we’re together? Doing....” He gestured vaguely between them. “...this? Okay, that’s it, mood gone.”

Phil smiled and kissed him again, and he really could spend the rest of his life doing nothing but kissing Clint. “I think I can do something about that.”

He pulled back from the bed and stood, toeing off his shoes and socks and letting his shorts and trousers fall. Clint raised his head and watched as Phil stepped out of the pile and kicked it away, his wide eyes roving hungrily over Phil’s body in a way that once again brought Phil’s mind to youth and the awkward, driving need of first nights.

All those nights, all those firsts, all that need were nothing to the thrill of being looked at like this, being looked at by Clint.

He knelt and eased the boots off of Clint’s feet, stood and bent to reach the waistband of his jeans. Meeting Clint’s eye, he paused and asked, “Okay?”

Clint nodded, licking his lips, and the sight of his tongue, his wet mouth, and his flushed skin sent a hot shiver through Phil’s belly. He pulled open the jeans and worked them slowly down, savoring the scrape of rough denim on soft flesh. Clint lifted his hips to ease the slide, and his hot, hard cock slipped free, springing up to slap against his stomach.

No underwear. Of course he didn’t wear underwear, and now Phil would have _that_ to think about when he was avoiding paperwork.

The jeans were tossed aside, and Clint pulled himself back to lay against the pillow. Phil took a moment to appreciate the unparallelled view of Clint Barton sprawled naked and willing in his bed, all smooth muscle and blue eyes and thick cock.

Clint shifted, and the muscles in his stomach rippled. “Feeling a little exposed here, sir,” he said lightly, his eyes uncertain and searching.

That was the moment Phil knew he was lost.

“Just thinking,” he said, crawling onto the bed to lay over Clint.

Clint grinned. “‘Bout how sexy I am?”

“About how lucky _I_ am.” He pressed a gentle, chaste kiss to Clint’s lips. “About how much I want every day to end exactly like this.”

“Oh.” Clint blinked. “Oh, well, I mean, I’m not planning on going anywhere.” Phil raised a brow, and Clint rolled his eyes. “In a general sense. I will eventually need to get out of this bed.”

Phil hummed. “Then I guess I should make the most of the situation.” He rolled his hips, and Clint arched up against him, gasping. “Touch me,” he said, and Clint reached for him without hesitation.

Clint’s fingers were rough and strong around his cock, and Phil hardened immediately at the touch. The rhythm started slow, just the steady drag of a dry palm, like Clint was trying to pull the pleasure out of him inch by inch.

“Lube?” Clint asked, breathless.

Phil reached for the nightstand and scrambled in the drawer. He couldn’t even remember the last time he’d used it. March, maybe? He was pretty sure there was a condom in his wallet, if things got that far. Pretty sure. He found the half-empty tube, at last, and shook his head, laughing.

“What? What’s so funny?”

“I planned for everything,” Phil said. “That whole ridiculous date. That stupid restaurant.” He braced himself up on his elbows and looked into Clint’s eyes. “Do you know I even had a script for surreptitiously asking you to spend the night?”

Clint laughed. “You’re kidding.”

“I made notes.” He’d burned the notes, obviously, but he had, in fact, made them. “And never, at any point in all those preparations, did it occur to me to make sure that I had lube and condoms.”

Clint’s eyes widened. “You’re _kidding_.”

“I do have them,” Phil said quickly. “I just suppose I could have planned better.”

“Oh for fuck’s sake,” Clint groaned, snatching the lube out of Phil’s hand. “Give me that. We’re not gonna get anywhere, at this rate.”

Phil chuckled, but the laugh broke off in his throat when Clint’s hand returned to his cock, now cold and slick. “Jesus Christ,” he gasped.

“Asshole,” Clint muttered, and Phil bit his ear. “Ow!”

“Talk to me,” Phil told him. “You said you thought about me when you touch yourself. What do you think about?”

There was a pause, and Phil thought maybe he’d gone too far, pressed too much. Then Clint said softly, “I think about your hands, what they’d feel like.” His own hand tightened around Phil and struck a smooth, steady pace. “I think about you touching me all over. I think about your fingers in my mouth.” 

It was a tantalizing notion, but Phil wanted Clint’s mouth moving and unoccupied, for now. He reached instead for Clint’s free hand and sucked the fingers into his own mouth, swirling his tongue around Clint’s knuckles and nipping at the callused pads. There was a catch in Clint’s breath, and Phil smiled.

“I think about your fingers inside me,” Clint went on, his voice quiet and raw. “I think about you fucking me with them, spreading me out, getting me ready. You go real slow, just a little bit at a time, getting me stretched just right, and I know it’s ‘cause you don’t wanna hurt me.” The hand on Phil’s cock quickened its pace, keeping time with the rhythm of Clint’s words. “But it takes so fucking long, it’s driving me crazy. I just want your cock in me, but you just keep going, keep pushing me open ‘til I can’t take it any more.”

Phil groaned around Clint’s fingers. He was close, so close he could taste it in the back of his throat, and Clint’s hand on him was a scorching, torturous thing.

He slipped the fingers from his mouth and pressed a kiss to Clint’s palm. “Keep going,” he begged. “Please. Please, tell me more.”

“That’s, uh, that’s usually as far as I get,” Clint admitted, his rhythm slowing. “By then, I’m pretty much ready to go, so I just finish up.”

Even in his fantasies, Clint never got what he wanted, and Phil was bound and determined to see that change. “So tell me what you want.” He reached between them and caught Clint’s cock in a grip with his own. His fingers and Clint’s slid over and around each other, and Clint gave a low moan, biting his lip as they stroked their cocks together in rhythm.

“Want this,” Clint breathed. “Just like this.”

“What else?” Phil pressed, his own breath coming shorter. “Do you want me to fuck you?”

Clint gave a whine in his throat. “Yes. Jesus, fuck, yes.”

“How?”

“Like this, on my back. Wanna see you, see that you’re the one taking me apart,” he said. “And I want it slow. I’ll yell at you, tell you to get a fucking move on, but you won’t listen. You’ll make me feel every inch of your cock, make me scream for it. And I’ll still be so tight, even after all that, it’ll take forever.”

That was a dream, Phil thought. He didn’t believe he was capable of that much restraint, not with Clint open and ready and wanting. Even now, he was sure he could hardly hold back the rising tide much longer.

“Then what?” he asked. “Once I’m inside you, once I know you can take it, how do you want me to fuck you?”

“Hard,” Clint answered, his eyes half lidded and dazed, lips parted. “So slow and so hard. All the way out and one hard push back in.” He punctuated the thought with a squeeze of his hand that made Phil see stars. “I want you to pound me like a fucking railroad spike. I wanna feel like I’m being split in two, and there’s nothing but you to hold me together.” He was gasping, panting, and Phil could barely hear over the rush of blood in his ears. “I want you to tear me apart and put me back together as a different person.” 

“No,” Phil said desperately, his lips pressed to the corner of Clint’s mouth. “No, no, no. Nothing different. No one else. Just you. Only you.”

Clint caught him in a kiss, hot and wet and full of need, and that finished him. Phil came with a shout, spilling onto Clint’s chest and stomach. Every thought and feeling emptied out of his head, leaving behind a perfect haze of satisfaction and... something else, something deeper, something better.

He lifted his head and met Clint’s eyes, so deep and so blue, and that something else swelled in his chest. His fingers were slick, now, and he curled them around Clint’s cock, stroking quick and sure along the hard, throbbing length.

Clint came without a sound, just a sharp breath and a shudder, his eyes locked on Phil’s, and his face in that moment was the most sublime thing Phil had ever seen.

He collapsed onto the bed, his arm slung over Clint’s chest, surrounded by the scent of skin and sex and _Clint_. “Oh my god.”

Clint breathed in deep and shifted Phil’s arm around him. They were pressed naked together, spent and sweating, and somehow that slight slide of flesh was more perfect and intimate than any of it.

“Is this our first date or our third?” Clint asked suddenly. “Or our fourth?”

“Colombia doesn’t count,” Phil replied. “And the first two only count for half.”

“So it’s the second.” He rolled to his side, hooking an arm around Phil’s waist. “So this only makes me kind of a slut.”

“Makes me kind of one, too,” Phil said. His pulse was slowing to a steady beat, all the better since his heart was pressed to Clint’s. “I suppose together we make one whole slut.”

Clint laughed and kissed him, and Phil really could do nothing but this for the rest of his life.


	2. Thursday, May 1, 2008. 2:03 a.m. EST

Phil watched the second hand tick past twelve, marking the passage of another sleepless minute, and resisted the urge to sigh.

Clint was fast asleep in his arms, wrapped in the unshakeable unconsciousness of painkillers and muscle relaxers. Wherever Phil put his hands, he could feel the rough edge of bandages or the tender swelling of bruises, the inescapable evidence of one more trauma to be reported and catalogued and shuffled away into Clint’s over-stuffed personnel file.

He wasn’t thinking about Clint lying on the sidewalk, face awash in fresh blood, or about the detached, clinical description Clint had given of Park’s first assault. He wasn’t thinking about the dozen executable plans he could set in motion to ensure that Park never came back from Antarctica, and he certainly wasn’t thinking about what Park’s face would look like as he writhed on the floor, slowly bleeding out from a precisely placed knife wound in his stomach.

The implement would need to be dulled in order to inflict greater damage. A letter-opener, perhaps? Or a steak knife. Maybe even using an arrow to gouge....

Clint stirred in his sleep with a faint whine, and Phil pressed a soothing hand to his chest.

“It’s okay,” he whispered gently. “You’re okay. I’m here.”

Clint gave a little snuffle and shifted, hooking one of his feet back around Phil’s ankle and burying his face in the pillow. His hand flexed around Phil’s, and his breathing evened out again as he stilled. Phil exhaled.

_Damaged goods_. Clint had called himself _damaged goods_ , like he was something to be used and traded and sold, relegated to the ten-cents table from which Phil had claimed him. He had his flaws and his baggage, sure, maybe even more than most, but Phil would have gladly given his whole life for just a fraction of Clint and called it a bargain.

For the first time, Phil allowed himself to think about Colombia. Not about red wounds and pale skin and the flash of a knife, but about watching a dying soldier slowly raise his arm and take aim at Clint. He’d seen it, caught the movement as it began, but it felt like he could have counted every synapse as the image traveled from his eyes and through his brain and out of his mouth in a shout of warning. He couldn’t move, couldn’t stop it, could barely breathe or speak. All he could do was watch the trigger compress under the soldier’s finger.

He felt now as he’d felt in that moment, perhaps with less intensity and urgency, but with equal helplessness and fear.

It was given that he would take a bullet for Clint - a hundred bullets, or shrapnel, or a guided missile, or the full force of a nuclear explosion - but the strength of that willingness was only as good as his ability to physically place himself between Clint and the impending threat.

He couldn’t block a bullet if he couldn’t move or stop an attack if he wasn’t there, and he couldn’t get between Clint and the thousand remembered horrors in his head. Clint could take care of himself, to be sure; he didn’t need Phil to fight his battles, or for anything else. Still, nothing put knots in Phil’s gut like having to sit aside like a useless cock and just watch.

It was the gasp of pain on the other end of the comm. It was the enemy spotted over a shoulder. It was every storm that beat and buffeted every nest. It was the tiny white waiting room in medical.

A car honked a few blocks away, and Phil sighed, his breath stirring the short hairs on the back of Clint’s neck, ghosting over the swollen, yellowing bruise. Clint shifted his head on the pillow and slept on.

The second hand completed another round, and Phil closed his eyes and wished for morning.


	3. Monday, February 2, 2009. 4:27 a.m. EST

Phil didn’t normally have a problem with nightmares. At least, not any more than most soldiers and a lot less than many field agents. He dumped out his worries in mandatory therapy, burned through them with work and distractions, or he talked things out - and this was new - with Clint.

Every once in awhile, though, some deep terror would reach up and catch him in its claws, and he would scream himself awake.

He woke up thrashing, gasping for air, fighting to break away from the grip on his arms.

“Phil! _Phil!_ Stop it. It’s okay. It’s me.”

The grey water in his vision faded back into the dream, and he found himself blinking through the dark into Clint’s face.

“It’s me,” Clint said again. “I’ve got you. You’re okay.”

Phil stopped struggling, his heart pounding and lungs burning, convinced he was still under water, sinking, drowning in the freezing waves of the English Channel. He breathed out slowly and met Clint’s gaze. His voice was still lost somewhere inside his aching chest, but Clint understood and relaxed his hold, easing his arms gently around Phil.

“It’s okay. I’m here. I’ve got you,” he soothed. His skin was warm, and the familiar touch and smell of it drew Phil out of the icy nightmare. “You’re okay. I’ve got you. You’re safe.”

Phil zeroed in on the feel of Clint’s heartbeat against him, using it as a metronome to measure his breathing. He tuned in to Clint’s voice, the sound and vibration, and tuned out the crash and roar in his head. Slowly, slowly, he relaxed.

Clint rubbed a hand in slow, steady lines up and down his back. “Same one?” he asked. 

Phil nodded, coughing to clear the imagined water out of his throat. “Same one.”

“You wanna talk?”

Moving stiffly, Phil wrapped his arms around Clint’s waist, drawing him closer, longing to melt into him and never have to be anywhere else. “Not about that,” he said. “You know how it goes.”

“Okay.” Clint shifted so that their foreheads were pressed together, bodies slotted against each other like they were made to fit this way. Phil closed his eyes and breathed. “I heard a joke the other day.”

Phil groaned.

“No, no. Wait. This is great.” He could hear the grin in Clint’s voice, which didn’t bode well. “So this string walks into a bar,” he began, and Phil groaned again. “What? That’s not even the joke.”

“Did Sitwell tell you this?”

“No, I heard it from Wilson. Now listen.” Clint nuzzled closer so that his breath puffed against the corner of Phil’s mouth. “So this string walks into a bar, and the asshole bartender says, y’know, fuck you, we don’t serve string here. So the string leaves.”

“Not a very tenacious string,” Phil murmured, and Clint poked him in the side.

“Shut up. So the string leaves, and it get’s itself all tied off and messes up its end.” Phil could feel Clint’s smile, feel the laughter gathering in his chest. “Then it goes back in, and the asshole bartender is like, you’re that fucking string from before. And this badass string just goes, no, I’m a frayed knot.”

Phil opened his eyes and pulled back just enough to look at Clint. “No.”

Clint grinned. “It’s a great joke.”

“It’s a _terrible_ joke.”

“It’s awesome,” Clint insisted. “He told me another one about a grape.”

Phil sighed. “No.”

“C’mon.”

“Stop.”

“Make me.”

Phil moved in and kissed him, softly, lightly, just a press of lips and open mouths. It was silly and cliche, but he suffered enough uncertainty to appreciate the appeal of a predictable moment.

“Hmm. That’s one way to do it,” Clint murmured.

“It usually works.” The taste of Clint lingered on Phil’s lips, and the nightmare pressed at the back of his mind, a reminder of how easily he could have woken to a silent, empty bed. “How’s the new recruit?”

“She’s... adjusting.” Clint shifted, his hand trailing idly along Phil’s spine. “She likes Fury. Won’t admit it, but she does.”

“She won’t admit she likes you, either.”

“She doesn’t like me,” Clint said. “She thinks I’m adorable. Like a puppy.”

Phil smiled. “You do have certain labradorian qualities.”

“Fuck you.” Clint nudged him with a toe, and Phil shifted away.

“Jesus, Clint. Your feet are freezing.”

Clint snickered. “Oh yeah? Well you can warm them up.” He shoved one foot up the leg of Phil’s pajamas, his cold skin raising gooseflesh where it touched.

Phil kicked him away. “Stop it. Just put on some damn socks.”

“Don’t wanna.” Clint looped his leg around Phil’s, trapping it. “Who needs socks when I’ve got a Coulson?”

Phil rolled his eyes. “I’m not your personal electric blanket.”

“You do get me pretty hot.”

“Ha ha.”

Phil stopped trying to shove off Clint’s feet and instead rested his hand on Clint’s thigh, now hooked over his leg. For a moment, he savored the quiet closeness, let himself trust in Clint to keep the nightmares at bay. Then, softly, he said, “It’s not the same dream.”

Clint drew back slightly, his bright eyes punching through the dark to find Phil’s, and didn’t say anything.

“It is, but it isn’t,” Phil went on. “It’s not just the Channel, not all the time. It’s Colombia, too. And Park, and Madripoor, and the Redline mission....”

Clint shook his head. “We made it outta those. It was close, but....”

“It was too close,” Phil said. “Every time, it was too close. I was almost too late, and you c-”

He broke off, pushing down the vivid memories of blood and pale skin and the shallow, fragile flicker of Clint’s pulse. He pressed into Clint’s chest, feeling the deep thrum of his living heart, and breathed.

“Hey,” Clint said gently, and Phil met his steady gaze. “I’m here.”

Phil closed his eyes again and sighed. “I know, I just....”

“No. Look at me,” Clint commanded. His voice was so certain, so even, that Phil obeyed in a instant, surprised. “I’m here,” he repeated firmly. “I won’t always be, but I’m here now, okay? One of....” The authority in his tone faltered, and he took a breath. “Look, one of us is gonna die, one day. Probably a lot sooner than we’d like.”

That struck Phil like a punch in the stomach, the horrible truth of it so baldly stated with Clint’s unyielding honesty. Phil’s eyes burned. “Clint, I....”

“No, listen.” Clint pulled him closer, so close that every possible inch of them was pressed together, and Phil could almost feel the blood moving in Clint’s veins. “One of us is gonna die, and it’s gonna suck. And whoever’s left.... I mean, you’re pretty much it for me, so it’s not like I’m gonna get over it, y’know, ever.” He paused, and Phil brushed a slight kiss on his brow. When Clint went on, his voice was soft but sure. “But we’re not there, yet. We’re here. You and me, right now. Tomorrow night, maybe we won’t be. But I’d rather be right here, in this second, with you, than in my head in a future without you.”

Something in Phil’s heart cracked, welling up into his throat. “Me, too,” he managed to say.

Clint smiled, real and open. “So _be here_ ,” he said. “I know it’s not that simple, and I know.... I know you’re scared. I am, too. But please just stay with me while you can, okay?”

There was so little that Clint asked for. Trust, honesty, and toaster waffles comprised the core of his basic needs, and Phil did everything in his power to provide a steady supply of all three. Phil made his choices, and denying Clint could never be one of them.

“I’m here,” he told Clint quietly. “You’re right. I’m with you. I’m here.”

“Okay.” Clint kissed him, soft and warm as the ambient heat of a banked fire. “Go back to sleep. I’ve got you.”

There were still nightmares waiting behind his eyes, and Phil wasn’t certain they would hold off for the night, even now. Clint’s arms were strong around him, though, his heart beat a steady lifeline that kept Phil tethered there, and Phil felt himself drifting, despite his circling fears. 

He slept through the night and didn’t dream again.


	4. Wednesday, December 1, 2010. 11:52 p.m. EST

There was a stage of exhaustion at which sleep became impossible. Phil had developed a habit, on nights like that, of stretching out on his stomach with his hand curled against the back of Clint’s neck or tucked under Clint’s chin. It gave him space to relax and a point of contact at which to feel the rhythm of Clint’s pulse and breathing, something to orient and calm him. 

Most nights, it worked.

Tonight, though, Clint was just as worn out and keyed up, and no amount of relaxation or breathing exercises was going to get either of them to sleep.

“Pop wouldn’t let me in the house, though. So I was just standing there, dripping wet, mud up to my knees, clutching this little demon cat that kept trying to bite me. Dad said it was the most pitiful thing he’d ever seen.”

Clint laughed. “Did they let you keep it?”

“Hell no,” Phil said. “Dad put it in a box and brought it to the animal shelter, but I went and checked on that cat every week for six months until someone adopted her.”

“You are _such_ a sap.”

Phil huffed. “Calumnies and lies.”

 

**12:27 a.m. EST**

“And he just.... I don’t know, it just kept happening. Anytime I was by myself, it seemed like he’d find me.”

“Jesus christ.”

“Yeah.”

“How....” Phil faltered for words. Every comfort seemed too small; every question felt crass. “How long?”

Clint shrugged. “I dunno. Til we ran off, so.... A year, maybe? Little less?”

“And nobody.... I mean, you didn’t...?”

“Barney knew.” Clint shifted, rolling his shoulders. He wasn’t looking away, but he wouldn’t quite meet Phil’s eyes. “I think that.... I mean, after we left, y’know, we needed money, and.... I guess maybe it gave him some ideas how to get it. How I could get it.”

Of all the awful things in Clint’s file, Phil thought, the worst parts had never been written down.

“Never told anybody that,” Clint went on, his voice thick and soft. “Never thought....”

“Clint....”

Phil reached out, but Clint pulled away, sitting up. “I’m gonna get some water.”

He was gone long enough for the bed beside Phil to grow cool in his absence.

 

**2:14 a.m. EST**

“I didn’t cry. I didn’t do anything, really. I just went back to work and went on like nothing had changed.” Phil remembered the funeral, a small, quiet thing, and the wake, smaller still, where everyone laughed and ate and had something kind to say. 

“You were in shock.”

“Probably,” he admitted. “Then, one night, Nick showed up here with a frozen pizza, a bucket of rocky road, and - I swear to god - a full magnum of the cheapest, sweetest paint-thinner moscato he could find.”

Clint snorted. “Wait, wait. Gimme a second to just document that mental image.”

“It was a sight to see, believe me. I told him, you know, ‘I lost my father, I didn’t get dumped’. And he said, ‘If you’d gotten dumped, we’d be going to the club’.”

“Okay, no, _that_ ,” Clint said, grinning. “That mental image, right there. You at a club in your sharp-ass suit.”

“Have you ever _been_ to a gay bar?” Phil asked. “If I walked in wearing a Dolce suit, all I’d have to do is sit down and wait for the line to form.”

“Can you blame them? I mean, I’d line up for you.”

Phil took Clint’s hand and pressed a kiss to his open palm. “If you were in the line, I wouldn’t see anyone else.”

“See?” Clint said. “Sap.”

“Just for you.”

Clint rolled his eyes. Phil just smiled and kissed his hand again.

 

**3:27 a.m. EST**

“We could have sex.”

“Yeah.”

“Do you want to?”

Clint seemed to give the question serious thought. “Not really?”

“Me, either,” Phil admitted. “I just thought I’d make the token suggestion.”

“Worth thinking about, anyway.”

“Yeah.”

 

**3:41 a.m. EST**

“No way, that totally looks like an elephant.”

“Are you blind? That’s clearly the Enterprise.”

“Hey, now. Which one of us is Hawkeye, here?”

“That is completely irrelevant.”

“Nope. It’s an elephant.”

Phil rolled his eyes. “Fine, it’s an elephant.” He pointed to a different cluster of dots on the ceiling. “What about that one?”

Clint squinted for a moment, then declared, “Delorean.”

Phil blinked at him, and Clint stared back, nonplussed. “I love you,” Phil said, and Clint grinned.

 

**4:02 a.m. EST**

“Are you a woman?”

“No.”

“Are you a man?”

“Yes.”

“Are you fictional?”

“Yes.”

“Are you human?”

Clint hesitated.

“Rick Deckard.”

“Fuck.”

 

**4:58 a.m. EST**

“We could leave, you know,” Phil said softly, running his fingers through the back of Clint’s hair. “We could just... go. Give notice, take our things, and find someplace quiet where we can work normal jobs with normal hours and come home and have dinner and make love and sleep like real people.”

Clint opened his eyes, and he looked at Phil with an expression of such profound sadness that Phil wished he hadn’t said anything. “No, we can’t,” Clint said. “I mean, we could. But we can’t.”

“No.” Phil sighed, and pulled Clint closer. “No, we can’t.”

 

**5:22 a.m. EST**

Phil glanced at the clock. “Almost time to get up.”

Clint groaned and buried his face in the pillow. “Can we play hooky? Please? I just wanna stay in bed.” He gave Phil his best pleading look, complete with pouting lip and big blue eyes. “We didn’t get any sleep, so it doesn’t count.”

“I’m not sure that excuse would get us much sympathy,” Phil replied. “Especially from the director.”

“He’d probably think we were up all night fucking.” Clint made a face. “And then he wouldn’t shut up about it.”

Phil yawned, rubbing at his eyes. “God. We’d be hearing about it for a week.”

“Am I crazy, or does he have kind of a creepy interest in your sex life?”

“You are crazy, but he is inordinately invested, yes. I think he does a lot of vicarious living through me.” He looked to Clint. “Does it bother you?”

Cint shrugged. “Little bit, at first. Mostly, it’s pretty funny.”

Phil hummed thoughtfully, still looking at Clint. Only half of Clint’s face was showing above the curve of the pillow, his eye half-closed and hazy, his skin flush from the warm bed. His short hair stuck up at odd angles, and there was a curve of contentment at the corner of his soft mouth.

Phil really couldn’t be blamed for kissing him. Clint made a little murmur of surprise and tilted his head so that Phil could reach more of his perfect mouth.

 

**5:30 a.m. EST**

The alarm beeped insistently until Phil reached over and hit the snooze.


	5. Thursday, March 3, 2011. 11:21 p.m. EST

There was a boy in Phil’s freshman dorm with a crew cut and a crooked nose, a brown-eyed biology major with perfect arms. He was sweet and funny and straight as a line in the sand, and Phil spent a semester and a half hopelessly in love with him. 

Phil wished, sometimes, that he could send his younger self a photo of Clint with the message, _For future reference_. He wondered, now, if he had known what it would be like to have Clint sprawled out beneath him with his slick fingers working in and out of Phil’s ass, would he have ever wanted anyone else?

Clint gave a twist of his hand, and Phil groaned into his shoulder.

“God. _Yes_ ,” he panted. Clint’s answer was to catch him in a kiss, fierce and hungry, the fingers of his free hand twisting in Phil’s hair.

If he could have sent back a photo of Clint like this, of his gorgeous, naked body shining with sweat and his cock hard and full against his stomach, Phil’s younger self would have had enough masturbation material to last him for years, until he finally found the real thing.

“Want you so bad,” Clint whispered against his mouth. “Love you so much.”

Everything inside him burned. Everything that he was needed every part of Clint in all ways, as requisite as air. If there had ever been a word in any language that could express the intense necessity of Clint to his existence, he didn't know it, and the only words that his mouth could manage were, "Fuck me."

Clint made a desperate, filthy sound, and his fingers curled inside of Phil, sending a shudder of heat up his spine. Phil tightened his knees around Clint’s hips and rolled them both so that Clint’s perfect weight was on top of him, surrounding him, their cocks pressed tight between them.

“Oh, _christ_ ,” Clint gasped. “Oh, god. Okay. We need.... Where’s the...? Shit.”

He fumbled for the nightstand drawer, slipping his fingers out of Phil with a slick, wet slide, and Phil sighed at the loss. 

“Other drawer,” Phil said, fighting for some calm in his voice. He felt shattered and scorched and was amazed that the words didn’t come out as bursts of fire and sacred ash.

Clint swore again and flopped across the bed to the opposite side. Every movement jostled Phil’s aching cock and seemed to spread his legs even further, every second laying him out more and more neatly, like a meal for Clint to devour. Phil felt consumable, perishable, and he wanted nothing more than to be eaten up from the inside out by the touch and taste and essence of Clint, to be claimed and consumed.

He ran his hand along Clint’s side, savoring the shift of strong muscles under his palm as Clint moved back over him with a triumphant grin and a silver packet in hand. Phil slid his hand around to the small of Clint’s back and pulled him down into a wet, graceless kiss, all tongues and teeth, too much in need for anything else.

“God. Oh, fuck.” Clint’s bright blue eyes were dark and hazy with lust, but they still burned through Phil’s skin, punching unerringly to his heart. “God, I love you,” he said honestly, earnestly, and something in Phil’s chest quaked.

He lifted his head for another kiss, deeper and sweeter, and let his lips drift away along the edge of Clint’s jaw, trailing his open mouth down the perfect line of Clint’s throat. Clint groaned, and Phil heard the rip as he tore the packet open.

“Come on,” he murmured, Clint’s throbbing pulse pounding a rhythm against his tongue. “Come on, Clint, please.”

And there it was, the perfect, familiar pressure of Clint’s cock easing into him. Sensation sparked up Phil’s spine, skipping across his vertebrae like a stone on water, and he arched up off the bed, opening up and drawing Clint in. Clint gave a startled groan and thrust hard, burying himself so fast and so deep that Phil thought he might come apart at the seams. It was so much, too much all at once, and, for a moment, they lay still with their foreheads pressed together, breathing.

“That’s it,” Phil sighed. “That’s it. That’s perfect.”

“Perfect,” Clint agreed, and his blue eyes were so so bright. “Still can’t.... I mean, I don’t....” He shook his head, the corners of his mouth curling. “You’re it, y’know. You’re everything I want, and it just.... It’s too good to be true.”

Phil’s heart pounded to the rhythm of Clint’s voice, like it was a real and solid thing that lived inside him. “You only talk like that in bed,” he said, breathing in the air and heat that came from Clint’s lips.

Clint grinned. “If I said it all the time, you wouldn’t believe me.”

“I would,” Phil assured him. “I do. I believe you.”

“Good.” He shifted his hips, and the flawless fullness inside of Phil shifted with him, sending pleasure crackling through Phil’s skin. “God. Good. ‘Cause I wanna.... I need to tell y-”

From the floor beside the bed, muffled through the folds of discarded clothing, Phil’s phone, predictably, began to buzz.

They froze, eyes locked on each other. Clint gaped in surprise, and Phil let his head drop back against the pillow. “No.”

Clint groaned. “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.”

“No,” Phil insisted. “Not now.”

“You should get it.”

“It can wait.”

“What if it can’t?”

“The world is not going to end in the time it takes to achieve orgasm.”

“It might.”

“Then we will die mid-coitus and satisfied with our lives.”

“Nope. Not this time.” Clint braced one wide, strong hand on Phil’s hip and carefully slid his cock out of Phil’s ass with a slow, wet drag. “You’re a fucking SHIELD agent. Answer your damn phone.”

Phil grumbled, “If the planet isn’t in imminent danger, I’m going to castrate someone.” He rolled to his stomach to reach for the phone, fighting the urge to grind into the sheets, desperate for relief. Clint, unhelpfully, reached over and gave his bare ass a good, sound slap.

“Find out what Fury wants,” he said. “Then I can carry on fucking you senseless.”

“Hold that thought,” Phil replied, with a nod at Clint’s slick, hard cock. The number display was blank, and Phil answered the phone with a curt, “What?”

He expected Fury to tease him, to laugh and ask if he’d interrupted something. He didn’t expect Fury’s voice, cool and flat, saying simply, “ _We’ve lost contact with Operation Evangeline._ ”

Every one of Phil’s senses snapped to attention. “What happened?”

Clint knew instantly that something was wrong and rolled toward Phil, asking quietly, “What? What is it?”

“ _I’ll brief you when you get here,_ ” Fury said. “ _Just get here now._ ”

“Yes, sir,” Phil replied, but the line was already dead. He ran a hand over his face and let the phone drop back to the floor.

“What?” Clint asked again. He laid a hand, hot and strong and sure on Phil’s back. “What’s going on?”

Phil let out a long, slow breath. “Evangeline’s gone dark.”

“What? No. No, that was rescue and recon. Sitwell and Natasha were running that. There’s no way....” Clint shook his head.

“Even the best teams run into trouble.”

Even the best plans went awry, Phil thought. Even the best agents could be caught by surprise. Even the best night could be dragged into a cold morning.

Clint sighed, nodding. Slowly, something like a sly smile curled on his face. “Guess we better go be heroes, then.”

“Not yet.” Phil reached for Clint’s wrist, running his thumb down the long blue line of the artery, over the slope of muscle and the jagged peaks of old scars. He should have been on his feet, throwing on his clothes and willing away this hard, aching need. He should have put on his professional face and leapt to action, but he knew too well what would be waiting in that briefing and how long it might be before he could begin to hope for another moment like this.

“A few minutes won’t make a difference, and I....” He met Clint’s eyes, bright as a blade and sharp enough to cut right through him. “Clint, please.”

Clint snorted. “You do know I can’t actually read your mind, right?”

“Can you not?” They were so close, lips brushing, the heat of Clint’s breath ghosting on Phil’s skin. “I’m thinking very loudly.”

The hand on Phil’s back drifted downward, pressing between the curves of his ass, and they really did not have time for this.

“Tell me,” Clint said. “Tell me what you want me to do.”

Phil held his eye and answered as evenly as he could, “I want you to hold me down and fuck me. When I walk out of this room, I want to do it with your marks on me.”

Clint’s bright eyes widened, pupils blown, and the muscles of his throat shifted as he swallowed. “Yeah?”

Yes. Yes, _yes_. He wanted to be swallowed up, eaten alive, sealed with signs that he was entirely, irrevocably, indestructibly owned, that he belonged to nothing and no one but Clint. 

Phil nodded. “Yeah.”

The grin Clint gave him was somewhere between wicked and besotted, and that alone made Phil’s heart race. “Think I can manage that.”

He leaned in for a kiss, rough and hard, his teeth scraping on Phil’s bottom lip. The hand on Phil’s ass flexed, and blunt fingernails dug into the flesh, leaving behind trails of heat. Phil groaned, and Clint smiled against his mouth.

“There’s one mark for you.”

Phil turned his head quickly and bit down on the soft skin of Clint’s throat, and Clint gasped. “Oh, jesus fuck.”

“Get inside me,” Phil ordered. “Now.”

“Christ. Fine. Don’t have to tell me twice.”

“That’s the third time I’ve told you,” Phil pointed out, as Clint moved to kneel between his thighs. “I don’t know wh- _oh._ Fuck.”

He broke off as Clint lifted his hips and shoved into him with one thrust, and every thought emptied out of his head. The pinch of pain put a sharp point on the overwhelming pleasure driving through him, almost too much on its own.

“You did say _now_ ,” Clint said, his voice tight. His grip on Phil’s hips was hard enough to bruise, but the kiss he laid on the back of Phil’s neck was soft enough to shatter mountains. “Good?”

“Perfect,” Phil breathed.

“Good. You’re probably gonna feel that tomorrow.” Clint gave a rolling thrust and struck up a steady, pounding rhythm, just hard enough. “But I guess that’s the point, isn’t it? You wanna feel it. You wanna walk around and feel where I fucked you, wanna feel that place where my cock should be.”

Phil spread his knees, pressing back for more, but Clint’s strong hands held him steady. “Yes,” he groaned. “That’s it. Yes.”

Clint pushed him down into the mattress, pressing his broad chest against Phil’s back and reaching around to grab Phil’s cock just as he sank his teeth into the muscle of Phil’s shoulder, 

“Do you need that?” Clint whispered, still fucking him hard. “Do you need proof that I’m yours? Do you need something to remind you?” 

He bit down again on the opposite shoulder, and Phil cried out. He had it backward, thought that he was the one bound, but Phil was too close and too far gone to tell him it was the other way around; Clint was a fire and Phil was his ash.

“I do, y’know. I am. I’m yours.” Clint’s voice was rough and desperate, skirting the edge between words and empty sound. “Always. All of me. And everybody knows it. Walk down the fucking street and it’s written all over me.”

His thrusts were long and deep, his pace unchanging, and his hand around Phil’s cock kept perfect time, point and counterpoint. Phil clung to the sensation and gave himself up to it.

“Is that what you want?” Clint was still talking, still pounding, and Phil was going to lose it the next time Clint’s tongue slid over a sibilant. “You want it written on you like it is on me? You want something to carry with you, you can have it. It’s yours. It’s all yours, and you’re all mine.”

The orgasm was sudden and shattering, and Phil lost a few seconds to the blissful emptiness of shaking and screaming through it. All he knew was that Clint was still fucking him, faster and more frantic, and his weight on top of Phil was hot and heavy and perfect.

“That’s it. Good,” Clint murmured. “God, I love you. So good. Love you so much.”

Phil braced himself on his elbows and buried his face in his folded arms. He was saturated with white hot afterglow, and the delicious ache of Clint slamming into him hummed through his bones. With the feeling of need still churning in his stomach, that vast something that was bigger than words, that resonated with Clint’s voice like an echo in his blood, he could have cried.

Clint only stopped talking when he came, nothing but a harsh breath and the violent shuddering of his body. He collapsed on top of Phil, heavy and grounding and real, panting against the stinging mark he’d left on Phil’s shoulder.

For a moment, there was nothing else. There was no mission, no danger, no chance this might be the last time they touched or fucked, no fear of returning alone to this bed. There was just the feel of Clint’s skin, the smell of him, and the sense that Phil had finally been completely consumed.

Then Clint sighed and gently pulled out, rolling away and leaving Phil with a cold ache and a sick feeling of loss.

“That hit the spot?” It was a flippant question, but there was a flicker of uncertainty in Clint’s eyes that Phil would never get used to and could never seem to banish.

“Of course.” In lieu of explaining that everything about Clint hit every spot he had, Phil leaned in for a slow, open kiss and said, “We have to go.”

A strange expression passed over Clint’s face, a look of something soft yet stricken. “Yeah. Fuck, yeah. If the team’s in trouble.... Shit. We gotta go.”

Just like that, everything shifted. They moved quickly, cleaned and dressed in under a minute, prepped and ready in two, every bit as efficient as SHIELD’s sharpest two-man team should be. Phil put on his crisp suit and his Agent Coulson face and, in the quiet corner of his head that housed the things he never said, wanted nothing more than to stay.

At the door, Clint caught him by the collar and pulled him close with a sharp tug. The kiss was fierce, searing, and just on the steady edge of desperate. It stole Phil’s breath, stopped his heart, and set his stomach turning in circles, and he wanted this and only this for every second until blood loss or a bullet shut down his pulse for good.

Breaking reluctantly away, Clint made a show of smoothing down Phil’s jacket and straightening his tie, the touch of his hands a tantalizing reminder. He gave Phil a bright grin and said, “Alright, boss. Let’s go kick some ass.”


	6. Wednesday, April 4, 2012, 12:22 AM

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Many thanks to the lovely JHSC for the beta.

Four months. Four months without sight or touch, with nothing but hurried texts and abbreviated phone calls. Four months without Clint, and being in his arms now was like a hit after ages of withdrawal.

“Oh my god,” Clint panted.

“Wow,” Phil agreed.

Clint collapsed beside him, curling in close, and repeated, “Oh my god.”

It was hot enough, in the lingering afterglow, to make the touch of overheated skin uncomfortable, but nothing short of the bed catching fire could have made Phil pull away.

“I get why Fury’s keeping us in separate corners,” Clint said. “I mean, it makes sense. It’s a smart move. It just really...”

“Sucks?”

“Sucks.”

Phil slipped his arm around Clint’s waist, savoring the slide of sweat-slicked skin and strong muscle under his hand. His pulse was still slowing, his body still drifting on the ebbing tide of pleasure, and he wanted nothing more than to fall asleep, wrapped in this feeling, and forget about the inevitable break of day.

“When do you head out?” Clint asked, and Phil sighed.

“Eight hours?” Phil craned his neck to see the clock. “Seven and a half hours. You?”

“Five hours.” 

Phil closed his eyes wearily. Half a night together to make up for four months apart. There had been a tension in his shoulders that he hadn’t realized was there until it began to lessen, soothed simply by being in the same room with Clint. Now, he could feel the muscles tensing up again.

He opened his eyes to find Clint staring back at him, serious and intense. After a long moment, Clint said, “Let’s get married.”

Phil’s heart jumped, not in surprise or nervousness, but because it always did when he thought of marrying Clint, when he felt the cool steel ring on his finger, even sometimes at odd moments when he suddenly remembered that Clint _wanted_ to marry him. He swallowed and made himself answer in a normal voice, “I thought that was the plan.”

“Well, yeah, but I mean, like, now. Tonight. There’s one of those twenty-four-hour places a few blocks away. It’d take maybe half an hour.”

Phil blinked back at him, stunned. “Clint, it’s the middle of the night.”

“Twenty-four-hour kinda means they don’t close,” Clint said, and Phil gave him a look. “Nat’s on assignment, but we can call Sam or Jasper, if we need a witness. Hell, you could call Fury, if you want.”

Eloping in the middle of the night was either wildly romantic or embarrassingly sordid, and Phil couldn’t decide which, or if it even mattered. “Leaving aside the fact that both Natasha and my father would kill us, I thought we were going to wait until...” _Until things settle down_ had been the agreement, but there was no sign of settling anywhere in the future. “Until we have some time to breathe.”

“Yeah, but what if there _isn’t_ time?” Clint’s hand was curled around Phil’s arm, holding on tight like he thought one of them might drift away. “What if the world’s not just going crazy? What if it’s changing? I mean, we watched _alien gods_ throw down in New Mexico. There are superheroes and supervillains and super terrorists popping up all over the place. Christ, and now they’ve actually found Captain fucking America?” He shook his head. “Phil, this isn’t just a weird couple of years; it’s a fucking cataclysm, and I don’t... I don’t wanna come out the other side and find that we missed our chance.”

“That’s not going to happen,” Phil promised him. “As long as we’re alive, we have a chance.”

Quietly, meeting Phil’s eyes, Clint asked, “And what if we’re not?”

Phil’s heart twisted. It wasn’t an unreasonable question, given the... given everything, but Phil wasn’t prepared to make decisions based on that possibility. Even if he had been, was it better to leave behind a widower than a grieving partner? Was it better to be left in mourning as a husband than a boyfriend?

“I don’t want to...” He rubbed at his eyes, and Clint pulled him closer. “I need a light at the end of the tunnel. I need something to look at and believe we’re going to make it.”

Clint frowned. “What about just, y’know, living? The two of us having a life? That’s something to look forward to.”

“Of course. Of course it is, and I do. It’s just...” It felt like giving up to admit that the moment they were waiting for might not come, to acknowledge that the resolution to this chaos might leave them farther apart than just a few continents. Phil knew what Clint’s answer to that would be, though, and he knew that Clint would be right. “So much of what we do happens in the dark. I want to marry you in the daylight, in the sunshine.”

Clint sighed, but the look he gave Phil was warm and fond. “You’re such a sap.”

“Just for you,” Phil said, pressing a soft kiss to Clint’s brow. “Next time we’re home, when we’ve got at least two or three days, then we’ll do it. That’ll give my dad time to get here, maybe even a few others, and we can have a chance to actually _enjoy_ getting married. What do you think?”

“I think I don’t know when we’ll _ever_ have two days at home,” Clint said. “I also think you’re stalling.”

“Maybe a little bit,” Phil admitted, and Clint’s mouth tightened. “Not because I don’t want to,” he added quickly. “It’s just... I guess I’m not sure why, except that I don’t like the idea of sneaking off in the middle of the night, like it’s something we have to steal time for.”

Clint gave him a considering look. After a long pause, Clint said simply, “Okay.”

“Okay?”

“Okay, we’ll do it your way.” Clint settled into the pillow, tucking his head against Phil’s shoulder. “I’m not wearing a suit, though.”

“I honestly don’t care. You can wear pajamas, if you want,” Phil said, and Clint brightened.

“Oh my god. Can we get married in pajamas? That would be _awesome_.”

Phil wanted to say, _You can, but I’m wearing a suit_. He wanted to say, _As long as it’s not tac gear._ He wanted to say, _We’ll see_. Clint’s happiness was a tangible thing, though, like a sweet smell in the air, and Phil wanted nothing more than to breathe it in. “Yes, we can get married in pajamas.”

Clint lifted his head, grinning. “I knew you loved me.”

Phil loved him so much that it hurt, that it left scars on his skin and black marks on his soul. “You’re alright, I guess.”

For that, Clint gave him a deep kiss, hard enough to bruise, leaving him breathless and aching. Without breaking away, Clint rolled on top of Phil, pressing him into the warm, rumpled sheets. “You realize what this means, don’t you?” Clint’s voice was low and rough.

Phil tried for a suspicious frown but suspected he didn’t quite get there. “What?”

Clint grinned. “It means we have time for round two.”

“Oh my god. I’m going to need... at least a few minutes,” Phil groaned, but Clint’s mouth was already moving down the side of his neck.

Round two was longer, slower, and, afterward, Phil slept soundly until Clint’s alarm woke him in the small hours of the morning. The lamplight cast sharp shadows on Clint as he moved around the room, dressing and packing hastily, and Phil watched him from the dubious comfort of the bed, now grown cooler with one less occupant. 

Clint left him with a kiss and a quietly spoken, “Love you. See you soon.” Then the light was off, and the room was empty.

Phil rolled over to curl up on the side of the bed that always smelled like Clint, hoping he might manage another few hours of sleep on his own. He didn’t.


End file.
